What I did on my summer vacation

Posted by Nicole

Yes, I realize it’s still summer, but instead of going on our yearly trip to Wildwood with Mr. Saver’s family, we decided to stay put and work on the house. In the past 6 days or so, I’ve painted the office room and straightened it out, set up my shelves (aka reloading them with tchotchkes and books), and the piece de resistance, totally redid the porch/back room.

I worked my tail off — the walls were kitschy 1970s wood paneling (I’m on a Yiddish streak today!) and I used two coats of oil-based primer and two topcoats of white eggshell finish to cover that up. Left the wood trim for now, but we’re thinking about painting over that to go with the new vinyl floor I put down. It’s a slate pattern and was super-easy to do thanks to stick-and-press installation. I did it the correct ’tiling’ way, starting at the center point of the room, which means I had to cut EVERY SINGLE EDGE PIECE. Now THAT was a pain in the ass, but the result was well worth it.

Here are the before, primer, and after shots:

I’ve been saving a lot of dough doing all of this stuff myself, but I truly enjoy it. Now, it’s back to work for a relatively relaxing day, compared to the 12-plus-hour days I’ve been putting in around the house.